Sunday, 29 April 2012

Adventures In The Stream Trade. Part 4.

Here then is the fourth and final part of our special series where I watch stuff that can be found online. And then write about it. Monkey see monkey do and all that.

One of the things that happens to you when you have a popular blog (Gee Note: Or in my case a depressingly unpopular one) is that every now and then a random stranger will email you looking to pimp their latest project on your website.

Now despite the fact that the regular readers of this blog consist of me, my brother-in-law, and according to my stat counter a single person living in a Danish town that I can't for the life of me spell properly, for some reason I also get my fair share of these. And I usually ignore them. Partly because I don’t really feel comfortable with advertising things I wouldn’t personally endorse (Gee Note: Unless I'm paid for it of course. Then you can put whatever the hell you like here and I'd quite happily lie through my teeth about how awesome it is). But mostly because, honestly, I'd be the last person you'd want to represent your products. No really. I'm a tubby ginger nerd who spends most of his time either shouting at the television, listening to 1950's blues records, or drinking inexpensive wine from a porcelain mug. I have no discernible talent, I'm about as charming as a toad setting itself on fire, and couldn't win a beauty contest even if my only rival was Fugly McUgly from Seadonkeytown. My point is, I'd be as much use promoting your stuff as Abu Hamza would be as a keynote speaker at a world peace rally.

So the "Would you be interested in…" pleas more often than not end up in the bin. Having said that here’s the trailer for “Elfie Hopkins”, a new British movie starring Jamie Winstone and Aneurin Barnard.

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(Gee Note: Yes. OK. I know. I’m a whore. A filthy blogging whore. But you have to look at this from my perspective. For a start, the lady who sent me this also included a link to her Twitter page, where the avatar is a picture of her wearing a top hat and a monocle. Secondly, I love horror movies. Thirdly Jamie Winstone is in this. A woman who somehow manages to be attractive while also looking exactly like her dad. Which, considering her dad is professional cockney and all around badass Ray Winstone, is a phenomenal achievement worthy of a hearty round of applause. I don’t know. Judge me if you want to but when you add it all up I can only fight against the tide for so long).

Speaking of movies, Mel Gibson was back in the news recently, after a letter written to him by screenwriter Joe Eszterhas was leaked all over the web like a crab trying to scribble down notes with a fountain pen. Essentially the story is that Gibson hired Eszterhas to write a script for “The Maccabees”, a project detailing the heroic efforts of a Jewish rebel army that took control of Judea some 160 years or so before three wise men spotted a star in the night sky and for no apparent reason decided to follow it. A couple of weeks ago Warner Brothers announced the project had been scrapped and floated the idea that Eszterhas’ script was the reason why (Gee Note: Which means it must have been worse than previous Warner Brothers scripts, such as Catwoman for example. Although, let’s be frank, the only way that could be possible is if it was carved in to a block of frozen urine and every character was called “Dude A”). Joe felt this was unfair, and sent a “private” correspondence to Mel claiming that the director of Braveheart never had any intention of making this movie. The reason? Well according to Joe it’s because Gibson is a big ol’ racist who “hates Jews” and freely uses terms such as “hebes”, “jewboys” and “oven dodgers”.

Now the shocking thing about all this is not that Gibson might be a huge bigot, or that Joe Eszterhas might have written a terrible screenplay (Gee Note: Gibson once screamed “F***ing Jews. The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world.” while being arrested for drunk driving. Eszterhas wrote “Showgirls”. So there’s a good chance both of them could be at fault is what I’m saying here), nor the ludicrous idea that Warner Brothers would bench an entire film’s development on the back of one bad script rather than just hiring another writer. Nay faithful steed, the mind blowing part is how this rather silly argument has ignited a war of words on message boards around the globe, including one douchebag who commented “Typical Jews. Something doesn’t go their way and they moan and complain about anti-Semitism. Disgusting.” obviously unaware that Eszterhas… er… isn’t Jewish.

But that’s the thing with the internet. In the non cyber-world there’s often a very thin line between exercising free speech and being a complete dick. On the world wide web that line doesn’t really exist, as hidden safely behind their keyboards people feel safe to voice their opinions no matter how stupid they might be. (Gee Note: Although as in the case of moronic Swansea University student Liam Stacey who was recently jailed for 56 days after making hateful remarks on Twitter regarding the cardiac arrest of professional soccer player Francis Muamba, people might want to think twice about this type of thing. It wasn’t the fact that he posted a tweet saying “LOL. F*** Muamba he’s dead #HAHA” that got him in to trouble you understand. It was the reply to someone who objected to it stating “Owwww go suck a n*****s d*** you f***ing aids ridden c***” that did him in. I know right? It’s like political correctness gone mad. Shit like this wouldn’t have happened ten years ago. Back then you could tell people to fellate anything you wanted to and you were considered a goddam hero if you did. Nowadays it’s all “Don’t tell them to blow this” and “Don’t tell them to blow that”. Entire country’s gone soft if you ask me. Possibly due to the lack of d*** sucking).

YouTube however is a completely different beast. In fact an argument could be made that YouTube shows the best and the worst of the internet. While you have some folks who use YouTube like this.

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Others use YouTube like this

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The above video is a perfect example of what makes YouTube so special. You see a lot of people seem to forget that if you post a video of yourself spouting off a bunch of controversial opinions then you can no longer rely on anonymity to save you. Mostly because EVERYONE CAN SEE YOUR FACE. Now I have no idea if that girl was serious or not when she posted that video. I’d like to think she wasn’t . I’d like to think it was a terrible attempt at a joke (Gee Note: I’d also like to think that unicorns are real and that rainbows are made out of chocolate. But they’re not. The world can be awful like that sometimes). But even if she was at best making a terribly ill-advised parody then, well, I’m guessing her life got pretty rotten rather quickly after strangers started pointing at her in the street and quietly whispering “Ain’t that the girl that hates black people?” .

And yet despite this people still continue to upload videos of themselves saying the silliest things. Here are some examples.

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Now while this may seem like an experimental way of telling the story of how one day the Soup Dragon, tired and frustrated by slaving over a hot stove constantly, finally arrived at the conclusion that he was wasting his time making green broth and that he could just eat the Clangers instead (Gee Note: I mean really? That's never once crossed his mind? He's a dragon for pity's sake. He could toast those pink bastard's like marshmallows in about three seconds and have enough meat to see him through to the spring. I mean sure they're his friends an' all, but he's got to wake up and realise he's living on a celestial body with no vegetation on it. Where's the food going to come from when the soup runs out? Companionship schmanionship. It's survival of the fittest), it turns out this strange lass thinks she has the power to channel the voices of a group of aliens known as Pleiadians “Pleadians”. A gift she is apparently displaying here.

Although, honestly, it sounds as if she's making kitten sounds before growling for a bit. But who am I to judge? I tried channelling the spirit of a space cow once. I put myself in a deep trance and connected to the space cow with my elevated consciousness before saying out loud "Oh great bovine of the stars. Willest thouest speakest to me…est". At which point the space cow used my mouth to transmit its message to the earth. Do you know what it said?

It said "MOOOOOOO". Just like a regular cow would. Waste of goddam time really.

Bigfoot enthusiast and Canadian (Gee Note: OK not the greatest description I've ever come up with I admit. Then again, it does sound a bit more respectful than "nutter with a videocamera" which was my second choice) Jim is up next, explaining to us why he doesn't tell people about all the times he's spotted a sasquatch in dem dar trees.

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You know I kind of feel sorry for the guy. No really I do. It can't be easy when your peers and colleagues openly tease you for your beliefs (Gee Note: You know, like the time I tried to convince one of Jennifer Love Hewitt's bodyguards that she and I are soul mates and destined to be together. That dude laughed at me too. Well, until he punched me in the mouth because I wouldn't leave and was "causing a scene". Stupid bodyguard. I bet there's not a single romantic bone in his body). So good for him I say. If he wants to spend days rummaging around in the forest looking for giant monkey men then so be it. There's no harm in it is there?

Then it struck me that I was watching him explain that he didn't tell people he'd seen Bigfoot on a computer screen some 3000 miles away from where he filmed it, which 18,000 other people had watched before me. Which caused my brain to malfunction and I had to lie down until I found myself no longer repeating the sentence "Wants to keep his man-ape love a secret so he put it on YouTube" over and over again.

Speaking of which, I don't know if you know this but writing poetry is really really hard. OK that's not true. Writing good poetry is really really hard. Writing terrible poetry is pretty easy. Look, I'll show you.

"But what about poetry about aliens and the end of humanity/birth of a higher plane of existence thanks to the Mayan 2012 prophecy which actually isn't really a prophecy at all?" I hear you cry. (Gee Note: I don't really. You've probably never said that sentence in your life. It's just I had to get here somewhere and, well, you were a convenient stepping stone. Really don't think of it as being used. Think of it as being useful). Well this chap has given that very thing a bash.

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And, er, you know writing good poetry is really really hard. (Gee Note: Although to be fair it's not that bad. And I'm sure his girlfriend is very proud of him. What was that? Well of course he has a girlfriend. Handsome guys like that don't stay single for very long. Oh wait... I get what you’re saying. You're right. He probably doesn't want to be tied down to one woman. Young buck like him. Sure, he wants to play the field a bit. And why not? Probably has a different woman every night. A right little ladykiller that one. Huh… no I'm sorry. I don't understand. What exactly do you mean by "gay"?).

Still he can take comfort in the fact that he's not entirely alone. A lot of people on YouTube are looking forward to 2012. Including this fella.

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I don’t know why but every time I watch that guy I hear someone shouting “GET YOUR HAIR CUT AND FIND A JOB THAT DOESN’T INVOLVE DEALING CANNABIS YOU WORKSHY HIPPY”. And then I realise it’s me.

Learn from my mistakes kids. Don’t get old.

And don’t believe everything your government tells you either. Because they’re a bunch of lying scumbags who went to the moon then came back to Earth and faked the moon landings. Why would they do this? Because they’re drunk with power and just like f***ing with us of course! Oh and aliens, according to this.

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Right two things. When Jack Schmidt is talking about “boulders” he’s not subtly referring to hidden extra-terrestrial artefacts on the lunar surface. He’s instead making a joke about the size of his balls. I mean sure it’s not a great joke. But shit no one ever claimed the dude was Jackie Mason. Secondly if you have to flip a picture upside down and Photoshop the bejesus out of it before you can get that squiggle looking a bit like a face but not really, then what you've got is less of a smoking gun and more of a moist flannel to be fair.

Still it’s not just the government that’s fibbing to you of course. Music executives are too. Especially the ones trying to get away with MURDER. I present exhibit A.

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(Gee Note: OK. This may make me a bad person, but I had a blast watching that. The “he must be evil because he’s Jewish” rhetoric. The way she describes the passing of Whitney Houston as “unfortunate” in the same way one would refer to a framed picture falling off the wall. The maniacal laugh at the end as if she’s planted a bomb underneath someone’s car. THE PICTURE AT THE FINALE COMING OUT OF NOWHERE. Of course, deep down I know that she’s somewhat deluded and that this type of thing is one step shy of being a full blown hate crime. But dammit if I didn’t howl with laughter all the way through it).

The undisputed King of YouTube conspiracies is of course my good friend (Gee Note: Not really. Pretty sure he thinks I’m bit of a douchebag actually.) Maggador.

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Ah Maggy. My old Swedish meatball. I could listen to you talk for hours…

…and I would still have no idea what the hell you're banging on about. Something about Christopher Columbus and a place called the "Vattykan". I don't know. I zoned out after about 30 seconds if I'm honest. Also, I hate to say it Edward, but you're looking pretty tired these days. Remember that young, spritely, lunatic wandering around a field telling everyone he was an alien and that we should all hug each other and sing songs? You ever wonder what happened to him? I sure do. That guy was all kinds of awesome. These days though Maggador you just look angry and sad. Which in turn makes me angry and sad. So much so I have to put on my cape (Gee Note: I say cape, it's more like an old curtain with tassels sewn on to it. But hey, you gotta start somewhere right? Real capes cost a lot of money. Which is why you never saw any of those "Occupy Wallstreet" folks wearing one. Bruce Wayne on the other hand wears them year round. No good moneybags orphan. It's like he's mocking the rest of us) and run around my kitchen pretending to fly until I feel better.

My point is, you need to go back to your roots man. Lighten up a bit. Turn that frown upside down bro. I mean even if the world is controlled by evil doers who are constantly doing evil to us, there's no need to be all Mr. Surley-Pants about it now is there?

I'll show you what I mean. Here we have some of Maggador's Swedish countrymen playing that all time classic Suspicious Minds. In front of what looks like around 50 of the most unenthusiastic audience members since Harry McStack's one man five hour show "Things you always wanted to know about beer mats but where afraid to ask". But does that get them down? Heck no it doesn't. They just keep playing their little socks off until the song ends.

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See? Those guys are using YouTube properly. Maybe you should think about taking a leaf out of their book. Form a band perhaps. Learn some great tunes.

Just stay away from spouting nonsense. In the end it just makes you look a little bit silly.

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Hi. Welcome to I SAW ELVIS IN THE WOODS. It's a blog about blood, sweat, and tears. If of course by blood you mean aliens, by sweat you mean sea monsters, and by tears you mean gently mocking celebrities.